


That Fire of Fire

by la_novatrice (fleurs_du_mol)



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Abigail Hobbs Lives, Alternate Universe - 19th Century, Alternate Universe - Detectives, And of course a cannibal, But he's still a murderer, Dark Will Graham, Hannibal Lecter isn't the Chesapeake Ripper, I really don't know how to tag this y'all, Mason Verger is totally gonna snuff it, Multi, Murder Husbands, Murder Wives, Past Molly Graham/Will Graham, Thomas Harris canon nods, Will Graham Loves Dogs
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-02
Updated: 2018-08-11
Packaged: 2019-06-20 17:03:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15538929
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fleurs_du_mol/pseuds/la_novatrice
Summary: “Some gifts hurt us, Jack.” Lecter finished his sandwich and took another drink of tea. “They feel more like sacrifices than boons because of the effort required to recognize and use them. Maybe he’s afraid of being burnt to ashes.”





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Kind solace in a dying hour!  
> Such, father, is not (now) my theme-  
> I will not madly deem that power  
> Of Earth may shrive me of the sin  
> Unearthly pride hath revell'd in-  
> I have no time to dote or dream:  
> You call it hope- that fire of fire!  
> It is but agony of desire:  
> If I can hope- Oh God! I can-  
> Its fount is holier- more divine-  
> I would not call thee fool, old man,  
> But such is not a gift of thine.
> 
> "Tamerlane"

_Baltimore, Maryland - Spring, 1895_

* * *

Margot Verger faced a problem: she’d failed to kill her brother. It was a regrettable one.

Since childhood, Margot understood that silent sedition was preferable to overt rebellion because it meant she survived. She also quickly learned how much the smallest misstep could cost her. She’d avoided most missteps until she tried to kill Mason, and didn’t.

Unfortunately, that was an irrevocable one. Because she’d acted “mannish” long enough and attempted murder apparently took things too far in a violent, masculine direction, she had to be corrected; Mason was insistent. He’d hired the best and most exclusive doctor he could find — institutionalization would only shame their family name, he said, and it would be too much trouble to try keeping such a situation clandestine.

He didn’t want anyone to think she’d been sent away for being pregnant, either. Anyone who was anybody knew she still wasn’t married. Margot was ill at either thought: a doctor reshaping her mind, or being incarcerated. But she appreciated Mason’s preference for a physician’s office rather than an asylum.

At the outset, she had supposed terrible things could happen in a consulting room just like they could in a hospital. The difference was one of them remained a more finite, contained setting. And by now, it was apparent that Doctor Lecter was very broad-minded, so Margot no longer entertained her fears about receiving “treatment.” She wouldn’t call him a friend and that wasn’t his function, but she could call him a confidante. She had not once suffered humiliation or pain at Lecter’s hands. There were no “cures” for hysteria and no forced conversions to “enjoying” sexual congress with a man.

 _An unconventional doctor_ , remarked Lecter, always with a smile, _for an unconventional patient_. Margot felt like an open book; there was nothing she could keep from him. He read her easily and although he was soft-spoken, he delivered his observations with certainty and an accuracy that cut her. But it comforted her, too. She suspected, but couldn’t know for sure, that he was an invert. Or close to it. Her heart said he was at least _partially_ inclined that way because her own proclivities for women never shocked or aroused him.

He didn’t regard them as something to be amended. They seemed familiar to his frame of reference without summoning the profane suggestions that they did for other men.

Lecter was about two feet behind her in his chair. His breathing was measured, steady. She faced the open window and hazy sunlight of early evening.

Like others on the edge of his field, he often adopted the approach of conducting appointments without showing his face or seeing hers. He claimed this meant her associations to what he suggested were less dependent on his social feedback. Their seating arrangement depended on the day. Today, Margot was turned from him. His voice washed over her like a cold, gentle tide.

“When you tried to kill your brother, did it occur to you that it was not the wrong action, but merely the wrong time?”

She paused before she spoke. Of course it had: she had no husband and therefore no means of support beyond Mason and the Verger estate. Her haste was the one thing she acknowledged as a fit of madness: she should have waited. She should have been married. She should have had an heir, preferably a boy. Papa’s will made the conditions of her inheritance — or lack thereof — very clear. Besides, bringing another girl into this world felt morally reprehensible.

“Yes,” she said. She smiled wryly and kept her eyes on the trees. The sweet breeze smelled of lilacs. “I’m glad I didn’t finish what I tried to do. I’d have certainly been locked up by someone. Mason has been very lenient, but that’s only because he’s alive to be.”

“Do you feel Mason’s character often permits leniency?”

Margot sensed the same sort of gallows humor she had herself in Lecter’s tone. She pictured his hazel eyes glinting. “It’s not leniency, Doctor. Mason is loyal to family, and I’m the only family he has left.” She added, “As imperfect and undesirable to him as I might be.”

“When the time is right, I feel it would be very therapeutic for you to succeed in your original plan.”

After months of these golden hours talking with Lecter, it was difficult for him to shock her. This did, but she endeavored to hide her surprise.

“Is that your professional opinion?”

“Professional and personal.”

“You’re not being paid to provide your personal opinion,” Margot said. She was not quite uncomfortable, but there was a compelling weight to what he implied that unsettled her.

“No humane person could listen to what you’ve told me about your childhood and conclude that Mason is more worthy of compassion or respect than you,” Lecter said. As always, he was equal measures of mild and direct. As it most often was, his assessment was unorthodox. “You took the chocolate because you thought acquiescence would spare you.”

“I don’t think you’d find many people — or doctors — who agree with you,” said Margot.

She focused on the flowers and bees who flitted between their leaves. For years she believed she had to accept Mason’s advances and abuses because they were all she deserved.

It wasn’t a simple matter to say whether they deterred her from the idea of wanting a husband or if she’d always preferred the company of women. She strongly felt the latter was more true than the former. But if that was the case, Mason had sensed her difference and exploited it even when they were children.

He’d been born, it seemed, with the predatory Verger knowledge of what weaknesses to manipulate in another. She only developed the same sense after study. There was an enormous difference between Mason’s innate aptitude and her necessary acquisition of the family talent. She could turn away from it; he couldn’t.

“I believe those of us who do agree, however few at the moment, will be on the right side of history,” Lecter said easily. “Have you ever considered what your legacy might be?”

“My legacy?”

“Yes. What will you leave the world when you are gone?”

Margot was aware that she was a woman of wealth and privilege. This granted her whatever material comforts she wanted. But she was just as aware that it all flowed from Mason, which was by their father’s design. She rarely dwelled on things in a way that made her full of self-pity, but she still entertained daydreams where she was autonomous and free of anyone’s influence but her own.

“I don’t get a legacy, Doctor Lecter.” She didn’t mean to sigh, but it slipped from her mouth to fall heavily into the room. “Everything I have is Mason’s. And when he marries, that may mean I end up with even less.” Her voice fell. “It may not. I don’t know.”

“Not all legacies are fiscal. And Mason would never look so fine as you in that dress, if it’s truly his in the end.”

She looked at her lap and had to smile. The dress was a recent purchase. “Olive isn’t his color. Neither is bronze. They clash with his skin. I favor Papa; he took after our mother. We don’t even look like relations. Once he ordered a suit that had similar fabric to this and sent it back immediately. His tailor was terrified.”

“He was probably worried he would lose his highest-paying patron.”

“Quite.”

“Am I correct to infer that you wore this for Miss Bloom’s benefit? It sets off your eyes beautifully.”

Margot shifted minutely in her chair. Alana Bloom was Lecter’s assistant. She was immensely clever and equally exquisite. She’d told Margot that she aspired to be a doctor in her own right one day, so she studied with Lecter when she was not helping with his research or patients.

That she wanted such a role drove Margot both to envy — she would not have denied any deserving woman a place in a man’s traditional profession; it was only jealousy over Bloom’s expansiveness of will — and desire. In the end, her desire was far stronger.

If it was evident to another, it must have been. Margot wasn’t concerned that it was too obvious or vulgar. In her experience, Lecter saw what others couldn’t or wouldn’t allow themselves to fathom.

“Wouldn’t that be presumptuous?” she said.

“How so?”

“Assuming that a woman is as interested in me as I might be in her doesn’t seem either realistic or prudent. Not unless there are specific circumstances within which my interest can be…” Margot trailed off, thinking. “Read. The majority of women prefer men, don’t they?”

Most of the situations in which she could have freely expressed her desires had been denied to her by her position. She was not at liberty enough to escape Mason’s watchful eye. Part of the reason for this was he knew where her own eyes strayed.

The demimonde of cafes and salons where women freely loved women, or the security of a Boston marriage, were each as unfamiliar to Margot as serenity.

Lecter said, “Not necessarily. Desire is fluid. And Miss Bloom is as unbiddable as you, in her own way.”

He offered no more hints than that, but it was enough to convey that did not actually disapprove of her thoughts about Bloom. It was just as well. Margot’s dreams kept her sustained at night when she was locked in her brother’s house.

Their childhood home held so many memories that it was haunted as any place from popular fiction. Mason no longer forced himself on her, but that peace could pass and if it did — when it did — she had fortified a palace of delights. She could ease inside and leave her senses if the need arose. It barely mattered that she’d never experienced Bloom. She could pretend.

“I suppose she would have to be if she wants to be a physician,” said Margot. “That’s not an easy path, is it?”

“I think she’ll appreciate the dress. If I may be forward.”

“I don’t think it’s as forward as choosing a dress to turn your assistant’s head.”

Lecter didn’t chuckle; she hadn’t yet witnessed him do so. Still, she all but heard his knowing smile when he next spoke.

“Our hour is up, Miss Verger. Can I tempt you with some armagnac?” He went to the beautiful sideboard in his consulting room, coming into Margot’s field of vision, already singling out two small, rounded glasses with short, thin stems before she replied. His hands came gracefully to a crystal decanter full of what looked like any other brandy. Margot knew it was probably a terribly dear or rare armagnac. Lecter was an aesthete. He glanced at her and she nodded in assent. When he brought her a glass filled with barely a finger’s worth, he said, “I wouldn’t want you to feel compromised on your way home. But this is worth trying. The man who distilled it has a wonderful sense of taste.”

“Is he a friend of yours?”

“He was,” said Lecter. He sniffed the liquid before he brought the glass to his lips. Margot did the same, and she caught apricot that had been warmed in the sun underpinned by mellow, deep butteriness. Her palette wasn’t refined enough to discern more. The taste spread on her tongue and it was sweeter than she’d expected. It didn’t burn, either. She looked up at him with delight. “You see?” he said. He was pleased by her reaction.

“And it matches your suit, Doctor,” Margot said. His tweed was amber and orange, echoing the tones of the armagnac as it caught the sun. “Well done.”

“I do aim for a cohesive aesthetic.”

“You succeed,” she said.

He inclined his head as a knock came on the consulting room’s door.

“Another patient?” Margot finished her small measure of spirit and set her empty glass on a little table inlaid with mother of pearl.

“No more today,” said Lecter. He went to the door and opened it.

Bloom stood on the other side of the threshold. Margot tried to look disinterested as she rose from her chair. She went to the window and pretended to study the birds, the road.

“Miss Bloom?” he asked.

Bloom said, “Inspector Crawford is here to speak with you. I know he didn’t have an appointment, but he said it was urgent. Miss Verger was your only patient this evening, so the maid let him in.” Margot felt Bloom’s eyes land on her back. “He’s waiting in the front parlor.”

“That’s fine. He’s long overdue a visit.”

“I don’t think it’s a social call, Hannibal,” said Bloom.

A little chortle rested at the end of her sentence and his given name. Margot wondered how they’d arrived at an understanding where Bloom called him ‘Hannibal.’ He was unerringly polite and always called individuals by their correct titles when he was in conversation with others. Margot was piqued by the thought that he allowed certain people to use his first name.

Despite herself, she wanted to enquire whether Bloom and Lecter had slept together, then quickly decided she’d rather not know.

“Still,” said Lecter. “It’s always good to see old colleagues.” To Margot, he said, “Miss Verger, it was a pleasure as always. If you’ll excuse me, I should discover what exactly is so urgent.”

“Of course,” said Margot. She turned to him, and Bloom, and kept her eyes on his face. “I look forward to next week.”

Lecter nodded. “Try to think over what I said about Mason. Remember, I don’t advise; I observe,” he said. After a slight, almost old-fashioned bow, he was out of the room and Bloom had taken his place.

She approached Margot silently, her footsteps making little sound on the vivid, plush Persian rug. Margot waited.

“Miss Verger,” said Bloom. She smiled at Margot.

Margot hoped she wasn’t blushing. “Miss Bloom,” she said. She was proud she kept her voice level. “How are your… anatomy studies?” The last time they’d made cursory conversation, Bloom revealed she was nervous it would take her too much time to memorize the body’s intricacies. She also wasn’t certain she’d be able to visit cadavers very easily.

That was one thing which, in retrospect, should have been an indication that Bloom was not a woman who clung to traditional social mores.

“Hannibal snuck me into some of his lectures. It was less difficult than we thought,” said Bloom. “All I had to do was lurk in the shadows. Seeing bodies cut open made all the difference.” She was still smiling. “Not to be indelicate. My knowledge has improved immeasurably since last we spoke. All I had then were books.” Bloom came a step closer to Margot and rested her arm on the window frame. “And you?”

It couldn’t have been wishful thinking that Bloom’s eyes ranged along her neckline. Margot shook her head and attempted not to follow Bloom’s gaze where it fell on her own décolletage, then lower.

“Life’s the same, for the most part. Doctor Lecter seems to believe I’ve made an improvement, but nothing feels particularly different. Still,” she said. “If he’s noticed change there must be some.”

“Actually, I wanted to speak to you about that,” Bloom said. “Your therapy, I mean. He’s suggested that I help with your sessions.”

Margot swallowed. “Help?” she said.

Bloom “helping” her was one of her most frequent fantasies. It made the most sense, situationally, and Margot was nothing if not pragmatic. She was also well immersed in the type of literature Mason would say doubly damned her to hell if he knew she consumed it — doctors and patients were a popular trope. Man and woman, man and man, woman and woman.

She raised an eyebrow at Bloom as she covertly studied Bloom’s attire. It was solidly middle class, but not without style. Bloom, after all, wasn’t a servant or even, strictly speaking, a secretary. Her high-necked dress was deep cerise with slate lace and buttons, while her dark hair was unadorned and neatly upswept. Small silver stars glistened on her ears. She was a little shorter than Margot and more delicately built.

“Yes. He thinks I need to have some experience in treating the mind before I try to pursue any formal training. And he mentioned it could be best to begin with a patient of my own sex.”

Bloom’s face and voice were calm, but her eyes were heated. Then Margot knew she hadn’t just hopefully imagined where Bloom’s thoughts led her gaze.

“Is there really someone waiting for Doctor Lecter?” Margot asked. She was curious.

Bloom leaned toward her slightly. “Yes,” she said. A little half-smile spread on her mouth. “I’d not lie to him. We just got lucky. Well, I did. You’re usually so keen on leaving quickly that I don’t get the chance to talk to you. Is that intentional?”

“Yes. It’s easier for me.”

“You don’t strike me as shy.”

“I’m not,” said Margot. She tilted her head and continued to appraise Bloom. “But then, neither are you.”

“Not at all,” said Bloom. A garden of promises was in the three words. She cleared her throat and looked at Margot meaningfully. “I hope you’ll only continue to improve under my inexpert care.”

“No doubt I will.” For the first time in their acquaintance, Margot allowed herself to truly smile at Bloom.


	2. Chapter 2

Visiting Doctor Lecter always left Jack Crawford feeling that even though he’d succeeded in his own life, his success would never match someone’s with the dual privileges of wealth and the right skin color. He felt no resentment toward Lecter — merely respect and some bemusement at his idiosyncrasies.

Jack faced many prejudices: they revolved around his background, which was not illustrious, and his profession, which still wasn’t always viewed as prestigious.

He wasn’t _truly_ a member of the police, after all. They made that too difficult for him.

But Lecter hadn’t ever voiced any of the stereotypes Jack was used to hearing about himself, nor had he condescended to bestow surprised, gratuitous praise upon Jack for reaching the status of detective inspector despite his “struggles.” Code for "color." There was always a genteel way for insults to be delivered.

Jack didn’t want meaningless platitudes. He wanted respect. By all appearances, Lecter gave it to him.

As he waited in the parlor for Lecter to come downstairs, Jack studied the gilt framing around an enormous mirror. It probably cost more than his entire apartment.

When light footfalls made their announcement in the hallway, Jack glanced toward the open parlor door.

Lecter smiled and ducked his head in greeting.

“Ah, Doctor Lecter,” Jack said. “How nice to see you. I’d say it’s been too long, but that’s probably a good thing for the sake of justice. I only ever come here when I’m faced with some kind of crisis or conundrum.”

It had been at least six months since he’d called on Lecter in a consulting capacity. A string of brutal killings across the city had left him stymied, and it had been Lecter’s insight into the killer’s particular mindset that saved the case. Unlike any detectives Jack had worked with until very recently — police-trained or more self-employed — Lecter was able to truly work backwards without moral judgement or trepidation.

He deduced his way into the minds of monsters who caused the general public so much terror and fascination.

Jack was here today because that singularity had changed. He’d found one more person in the world who could do what Lecter did.

Will Graham had done it better, but it had broken him.

Perhaps, and Jack was musing on this idea even now, Lecter was insulated from the horrors he was able to so neatly detangle because he wasn’t a policeman or an inspector. As a surgeon, he’d seen bloody things. Diseases. Plenty of death, too. But he had never been never an enforcer of the law in one of the most infamous cities in the country.

Before coming to Baltimore, Graham had been.

“What is your conundrum, now?” said Lecter affably. “And do please sit.” His eyes scanned over Jack. “I see you’ve retained your hat and gloves, which suggests you want to leave quickly. But I’ve taken the liberty of requesting a little tea. I prepared the sandwiches myself earlier today, and didn’t expect to have someone with which to share. It’s all the better when a meal, however simple, is shared.”

Jack had to smile. He placed his hat on the marble above the fireplace and put his gloves next to it. The weather was mild, but he knew the evening would turn chilly. It was best to be prepared. He never quite knew how long he would be out when he left home for a day’s work. Only after he sat did Lecter take a seat, too.

“Thank you, Doctor. I haven’t managed to eat since breakfast. That was a very long time ago.”

“You need to look after yourself better. Bella can’t do it all herself. Take a little more care.”

“Doubtless, that’s the truth,” said Jack. He settled in his chair. As he thought about what he needed to request from Lecter, the smile slid from his face. He went directly to the heart of the matter. He was always blunt, often accused of being tactless. “You’ve heard of the Shrike, I’ll bet.”

Lecter nodded. “The killer who somehow keeps evading police, Pinkertons, private investigators...” He was counting on his long fingers for emphasis. “Still more private investigators hired by angry families... yes. He’s going after a very specific type of young women. Fair, auburn-haired, pretty... but not beautiful in any remarkable manner, or so the reporters say. I think that’s a bit rude.” He folded his hands in his lap and crossed his legs.

“It’s not rude if it’s true,” said Jack. “They’re not what society would call stunning.”

“Still, seems best to let the dead be dead in dignity. Or at least in quiet.”

“We’ve no idea how he’s letting the dead be dead,” said Jack, frowning. “Well... I made a hire a few weeks ago. First I’ve done in over a year. You know I don’t have many employees. Don’t tend to trust people, and I don’t have enough money to make expensive mistakes.”

“It is one of the things I both admire and lament about you.”

“My lack of capital, or my issues around trusting my fellow man?” asked Jack archly.

“The latter,” said Lecter. “The prior can be changed fairly easily. But a lack of trust? Makes for a lonely life.” He smirked. “You hired a new man, and...”

“The police contracted me in the first place due to all of this business, and now they’re getting restless. I had to do something or risk the case going to someone else. They’ve been looking for a reason to boot me. I refuse to let go of it, so I looked for the best. The most singular. And I found it.” Jack raised his eyebrows. “His name is Will Graham. He used to work down in New Orleans with the police. Came highly recommended by an old friend there. I hope he can help catch the Shrike.”

“Clearly he hasn’t, or we’d have heard about it in the papers.”

Jack tapped his fingers on his armrests. He wasn’t angry with Graham for suffering difficulties, but he was impatient that such a vicious killer was still at large and his own reputation was also at stake.

He was hesitant to convey the extent of Graham’s distress for fear of losing him to bedrest.

Still, Jack believed Lecter wasn’t quick to jump to conclusions; he wasn’t the type of doctor who immediately prescribed sedation or a hospital visit for an unwell mind. In a word, he was _modern._

Jack had heard other physicians of many different specialties mutter that he was too progressive.

“Frankly, this last crime scene seemed to break Graham. You know, the Shrike doesn’t leave — hasn’t left — scenes. He leaves voids. Missing women. We still don’t have any of those bodies. We don’t even know where to begin looking for them. Not really.”

“Then what was the nature of this recent crime scene, if I may ask?”

“It was strange,” said Jack. He sat back. “Now, we have one body. And I’m not overly pleased about it. I thought I’d feel better. I don’t.”

“It wasn’t strange just because you got a body?”

“No,” Jack said. He stroked his tie idly, thinking. “Graham was sure it was the Shrike, though. By proxy, that means I’m sure.”

They’d gone to a small townhouse to conduct an interview with the mother and father of the latest woman to go missing. Her family and friends feared she’d fallen prey to the Shrike. Minnie fit a similar description as the other women. The last her parents knew, or believed they knew, she was on the train to her cousin’s home in the countryside. The cousin had just had a child; Minnie was supposed to help around the house for a few months until the baby was a little older and things could be more easily managed by the new mother.

Part of the incentive to this, they’d told Graham and Jack, was that she’d be out of the area — away from the Shrike’s potential interference. Jack didn’t have the heart to remind them that the Shrike’s young ladies hadn’t all disappeared from Baltimore. He didn’t want to be the bearer of more bad news. The Jacobis already distrusted him and spoke more openly to Graham.

Minnie never made it to her cousin’s, but she also never came home. The train guards all swore they hadn’t seen her.

Then, during the interview, Graham noticed the family’s dog, a little spaniel, was acting oddly. Both Minnie’s mother, who worked as a secretary for a banker, and her father, who worked as a city clerk, had been home barely half an hour before Jack and Graham arrived.

But neither had paid much attention to their dog, who was agitated and fearful. He lingered in the room with the four humans and constantly glanced at the doorway leading to the stairs as though waiting for someone to come down them.

Jack assumed he missed Minnie and believed she was just hiding away somewhere.

Yet, after watching this behavior with a wondering expression for a few minutes, Graham’s eyes hardened. Jack would never forget the look on his face.

Graham blandly said to Jack, “I need to go upstairs.” Before he left the tiny parlor, he added, “Keep them here.”

Jack was mystified, but did as Graham said and tried to allay the Jacobis’ nerves.

 _He’s just being thorough,_ he'd said as the dog followed Graham. _There’s nothing to worry about._

He was wrong. Graham thundered back down the stairs within five minutes — he wasn’t a large man and he could move deliberately, softly, but Jack could tell he’d been shaken by something; he was carrying the dog, too, who was then whimpering — and went straight to Jack like the Jacobis weren’t present.

Then Graham said to him in an undertone, “He put her back.”

That was what Jack told Lecter. “He put her back.” Lecter waited for more elaboration; his eyes widened slightly in a question. “The Shrike had taken Minnie Jacobi for whatever purpose he had for her, only something about her wasn’t quite right.” Jack sniffed. “That’s what it seemed. We think he took her before she even left to catch a train, which would have been while her parents were working — sorry, Doctor, I’m telling this all backwards — and he killed her. But he saw fit to place her back into her bedroom at some point. In her bed. It was really something. I’ve never seen anything like it in all my years in this profession.”

She’d seemed asleep. Her eyes were closed and one arm had been placed under her blanket. The other rested on top, relaxed.

When he and Graham finally got Mister and Missus Jacobi out of the house, which took a police officer to restrain Minnie’s hysterical father and a sedative to calm Minnie’s distraught mother, they lifted Minnie’s blanket and sheet to find she’d been changed out of her travel clothes.

The Shrike must have found a nightdress in the wardrobe and carefully attired her for bed.

Lecter was quiet as his maid brought them the spread of sandwiches and tea.

Once he gathered his thoughts, he said, “Was it an apology?”

“That’s what Graham said,” said Jack. He shook his head and tried not to sound too disgusted. “What kind of an apology is that? He kills a daughter and leaves her for her parents to find maybe... days later? We’re still not positive about a timeline. I’m waiting on autopsy reports. I shudder to think what might have happened if her mother had found her. The poor woman was ready to faint when she realized why we needed to go upstairs.”

“Perhaps it’s the best or only apology the Shrike is capable of,” Lecter said. He heaped a delicate china plate for Jack and handed it to him. “I forget how you take your tea.”

“Just milk, please.”

“So, do you need me as a consultant?” Lecter poured their tea and slid one gold-rimmed cup and saucer with delicate pink rose patterns very gently toward Jack. “I’m not exceedingly busy at present. I could arrange something, if you needed me.”

Either the sandwich was the most delicious thing Jack had eaten in his life, or he was just famished and anything would have tasted divine. He finished chewing and swallowed before he said, “No, Doctor. I need you to treat Graham. He’s the bloodhound I want on this case, but I need him of sound mind. He realized Minnie Jacobi was upstairs just by watching a stupid little dog.” He took a sip of tea. It was an excellent Assam that had a golden hue even with a little added milk. “Currently, he is on the verge of being... unsound.”

“In what way is he verging on unsound?”

“I can’t explain it. I think it would be best for you to meet with us and judge for yourself when he’s in both of our presences. Then, obviously, his therapy would be on a man-to-man basis between the two of you. But first, I’d like you to see how he interacts with me.”

“That might be considered disingenuous by some in my profession. I profile people, of course, but they’re my patients, or they’re criminals,” said Lecter. He was wry. “Would you tell him why we were meeting?”

Jack sighed and put his second little sandwich down on its plate. He already knew Graham well enough to understand he’d be hostile to the thought of any kind of therapy.

“No. If I did, he’d tailor his behavior to get me to leave him be. He’d perform normalcy because he hates interference. But Graham does not need to be left alone with whatever is inside his head.”

“How sly of you,” said Lecter. “And of him.”

Jack thought Lecter might disapprove of his wishes, but couldn’t quite tell if it was more disapproval or amusement. “I wouldn’t ask it of you if I wasn’t worried,” he insisted.

“And if your bloodhound wasn’t compromised,” Lecter said. He took a long, savoring sip of his tea. “I don’t doubt you’re worried.”

Again, Jack sighed. “I’m asking as a friend. Will you do it?”

“I’ll attend this first meeting. Then if he consents and I think I’m the right physician for the situation, I’ll provide him with treatment. Tell me a little about your man, Jack.”

Lecter ate some of his first sandwich, fixing Jack with an inscrutable gaze.

“He’s different,” said Jack, looking around the room. Lecter was a world traveller, and the parlor wasn’t crowded with mementos as was the current fashion — Lecter was more restrained than that — but it was occupied by a few interesting curios. Exotic prints, a sculpture here and there. “Almost prohibitively unlike anyone else I’ve ever met.”

“In what way?”

Jack wanted to comment how, in that instant, he felt the same sense of incomprehension toward both Graham and Lecter, and it had taken seeing the latter again to realize it was such a similar feeling. He refrained.

But his lack of understanding felt like it ran deeper than the abilities they each shared.

“Most of them. In most ways,” said Jack with a quiet chuckle. “He can take anyone’s point of view. My friend warned me about it and I didn’t take his warning seriously. But it’s what makes Graham so... good. I think his aptitude unsettles him. He should have chosen a different job. Doesn’t seem able to compartmentalize because he’s always in the thick of it.” He shook his head in consternation. “You know, he took the Jacobis’ dog home with him. They didn’t want it. Seemed to blame it for not stopping the Shrike.” Resentfully, Jack added, “It was a cocker spaniel, or looked like it. Couldn’t have really done anything to help, for God’s sake.”

“That just hints at Graham’s humanity, not his oddness,” said Lecter. “Doesn’t it?” He took another bite.

“Well, his ability has driven him to oddness, if you can see what I mean. Because he’s never sure whose thoughts he’s thinking. His, or a murderer’s.”

“He lacks a solid sense of self?” Lecter was intrigued, but not appalled.

“No, he knows who he is. I can tell.” Jack wondered if he wasn’t explaining any of this properly, but such was the nature of Will Graham. “He just doesn’t like who he is. He’s curmudgeonly. I don’t understand it, Doctor, and I won’t pretend to,” said Jack. “I’ve wanted to work with the law since I was eight years old. I learned how to catch criminals through hard work, study, and practice. Seems to me that God’s given Graham a gift and all he wants to do is burn it out of spite.”

“He might wish he could have burnt it before it burned him,” said Lecter.

Jack gawped at him.

“Some gifts hurt us, Jack.” Lecter finished his sandwich and took another drink of tea. “They feel more like sacrifices than boons because of the effort required to recognize and use them. Maybe he’s afraid of being burnt to ashes.”

Jack wasn’t sure what to make of that, so he merely grunted an assent and continued to drink his Assam.


	3. Chapter 3

Charlie, the brown and white spaniel, was runty, jumpy, and couldn’t decide where he wanted to settle. Will Graham sympathized with him.

The Jacobis hadn’t said what the dog’s original name was — by the time Will was offering to take him off their hands, he could tell they didn’t care at all what happened to him — so he was rechristened. There wasn’t a real reason. He just struck Will as a “Charlie.”

Charlie slunk over to Winston, the first stray Will acquired since moving to Baltimore only a few weeks back, and gingerly sniffed his paws. Will eyed this interaction to make sure nobody became cagey. So far, they’d behaved themselves. Charlie didn’t seem to have an aggressive bone in his little body, and Will was sure Winston was beaten at some point, so neither dog possessed the disposition to be terribly domineering. Winston, a mutt with what looked to be mostly shepherd and retriever stock, was much bigger than Charlie, but he was mild and docile.

After taking a nip of bourbon, Will said, “Good boy, Winston.”

Winston’s ears perked up at Will’s voice and his tongue lolled. He cocked his large head and proceeded to sniff at Charlie as Charlie sniffed him.

Will sat back in the lumpy armchair and tried to relax his shoulders. They hadn’t unclenched in days. Being on his own helped and he was thankful, not for the first time, that he’d managed to have a house to himself.

That was one of the conditions he’d told Jack Crawford when they first began negotiating his hire: no housemates, no boarding houses, no communal rooms. No sharing a living space whatsoever. He was incapable of it. Crawford, who’d wanted him desperately, was happy to oblige.

Will’s accommodation was tiny and secluded, but it was also clean, if threadbare, and private. Will didn’t mind that his pay was lower than what he was used to — part of what would have been his salary went to securing this house — he had seclusion. Apart from knowing himself well enough to understand he needed it naturally, he’d suspected and was right that this case would tax him. The strain, in turn, would have made him irritable and simply unable to share the air with strangers at the end of a working day. Especially a family. He couldn’t have been a boarder in a family home. He was lucky enough to be able to declare all of this and have it respected.

Crawford had a reputation, but so did he. Will had emerged as one of the best inspectors in the South, then the country.

Papers called him an eccentric divorcé while speculating whether the divorce was legal, and occasionally they intimated that he was a mean-spirited man. But no one ever doubted his acumen, and crucially, it wasn’t known that he was a functional drunkard. Public sentiment wouldn’t tolerate it, which would have impacted his prospects outside of New Orleans — a city where it didn’t overly matter what intoxication he favored even if its press chose to pass judgement on him. Will went to great lengths to keep his weakness to himself and, for the most part, he succeeded.

Nobody, even the most forward-minded, would call it “medicinal” if they saw how much he imbibed.

It didn’t do enough to calm his mind, now — although it had in earlier days — and an old crutch had developed into a habit. He was three fingers in, yet Minnie Jacobi still lingered before him like a beautiful painting.

Almost two days had passed since he found her. Crawford said he’d send word when the coroner finished Minnie’s autopsy. But Will wasn’t himself; he was the Shrike: that was the insurmountable problem.

Sympathy, sympathy, sympathy.

Sympathy, even love, was what her body repeated and revealed. Will could have reckoned with almost anything else, but this emotion lingered with him like a sickness he couldn’t shake.

A body had never — not ever — whispered, “I’m sorry; I feel sorry for you.”

He’d seen scores of them. Seen scores of killers.

Been scores of killers.

But before Minnie, slain bodies howled of his rage, lust, fear, futility, jealousy, victory. Love and passion on occasion — but not the kind he’d seen enacted toward Minnie. Some bodies were even earnest poems that murmured of hope: they were sacrifices to God or unnamed gods. At times, they were bargaining chips. On the other hand, suicides had an eerie peacefulness or an aching sense of unfinished business.

Will didn’t class them with murders, regardless of what the law or technicalities said they were.

This all made sense to him, despite wearing him down.

The Shrike — no, Will-as-the-Shrike — was sympathetic toward Minnie and her family. Something was wrong with her and whatever that was, it made him feel badly, feel pity. Minnie was a suggestion of personal remorse. She carried a taint of moral misgivings, although a man like the Shrike wouldn’t and couldn’t stop murdering yet. He hadn’t created an opus or had his shining moment of resolution. There was always something of the kind toward the end, whether or not the culprit was caught alive, and Minnie didn’t signify an ending; she signified a hastening. Will wasn’t sure who inspired his love.

Minnie, in some manner, had inspired his pity. But she wasn’t who he really loved.

That love did push him to tenderness. It drove him to find her clean nightdress in her wardrobe, and compelled him to replace her in her bedroom. The evidence didn’t say she’d been taken directly from the room — Will posited, and the evidence agreed, that it had been near the garden behind the house. It wasn’t communal and footprints in the mud matched the size of Minnie’s boots. The Shrike was clever and careful. He hadn’t stepped anywhere he could leave a print.

Will sighed. He watched a fly hover around the lamp at the table near his elbow, then said to Charlie, “Want a walk, sweet boy?”

But Charlie had fallen asleep under the windowsill. Will smiled to himself. His glass was heavy in his hand and tilted toward the scuffed wooden floor. He righted it and took another deep, lingering sip. He wondered if the Shrike liked bourbon or rye, and hoped that was one thing they didn’t have in common.

He could forgo a lot of interests and comforts for the sake of keeping mental distance from his quarry, but whiskey wasn’t one of them.

Maybe he’d take a walk without Charlie. If spirits weren’t helping, opiates could. He’d already passed several establishments that looked like their proprietors wouldn’t either rob or kill him outright.

His body made the decision for him and he stood. Winston thought he was going out, too, and Will had to say, “No, just hold down the fort, pal.”

Winston whined but resettled without more protest. Ruefully, Will grinned at him as he donned his old springtime coat and hat. The evening smelled like coming rain, a promised collision of earth and sky. Before he left the house, he made sure the lamp was out and the door was locked, but left the window cracked for the dogs. It got too stuffy indoors without ventilation.

“Mister Graham? Or is it more polite to say ‘Inspector’ Graham?”

The voice belonged to a woman; Will wasn’t expecting anyone. He looked with a scowl and a slim, young redhead waited for him on the other side of the low front hedge. “It doesn’t matter to me. But I don’t talk to strangers,” he said.

She just smiled and shook her head. “I see your gracious reputation is warranted.” Will cocked an eyebrow at her as she took a step toward him. “Miss Fredericka Lounds,” she said, proffering her small hand.

Will didn’t take it. “It’s not very safe out for lone, pretty women right now.” His eyes lingered on her curls. “Though… I suppose you’re actually too old and ginger for his tastes, now that I’m really looking.”

The coral light of the setting sun peeking through clouds, as well as the emerald fabric of her hat, both complimented her hair.

The Shrike favored muddier hues in his victims: Minnie’s hair was only just auburn under the right lighting. He also targeted very young women in their late teens and early twenties. Lounds was at least half a decade older, if not a little more.

“You think the Shrike is loitering outside your house? That would be convenient,” said Lounds. She let her hand fall. “For both of us. I need to get something interesting to my editor by tomorrow afternoon, and you weren’t doing a thing but drinking yourself into a stupor. Is that a nightly occurrence for you?”

“I’m from New Orleans,” said Will. “You’d be pressed to find someone there who didn’t do it every night.”

He sized her up. She was well-dressed at first glance, though not well-off on a deeper inspection. Her clothes were only a few months old but cheaply made. This was a woman who sang for her supper and didn’t have much else to fall back on: no family money. She didn’t wear a wedding ring, not that it meant anything either way in the current social milieu.

Judging by her body language and tone of voice — almost flirtatious, certainly coyly blasé — Lounds wouldn’t be averse to trying to seduce him. She hadn’t switched tactics, yet, but she might.

“I’ve never been, but I know what people say about it. Everyone does,” she said. Her eyes kept moving and searching his face. She didn’t have a notebook and pencil, but she may as well have had them. Will felt like he was being studied — which was exactly what she was doing. “How do you like Baltimore? You should feel at home, already. We’re fairly disorderly. And rather small.”

“I don’t.”

She laughed as though he’d said something witty. “What about Inspector Crawford? Do you enjoy working for him? He’s unorthodox.”

“He’s fair,” Will said.

“That’s all?”

“And very good at his job,” said Will, smiling without any sincerity. Crawford was indeed good at his job, but that wasn’t the point.

“So are you,” Lounds said. “I’ve read up on you, you know. I’ve also read your professional papers on behavioral science. Criminality. Deviance.”

“Then you’re very well read.”

“For a woman?” she said.

So perhaps she wasn’t going to try to seduce him. She’d bait him, instead. Of the two, Will knew which he preferred; he disliked being provoked.

“No,” he said. “For anyone.”

“Thank you for the compliment, then.” Lounds looked up into his face with morbid wonder in her expression. Will kept from recoiling. He abhorred it when anyone displayed that much, and that kind of, curiosity in him. “What are you up to, now?”

“Just going for my evening constitutional.”

“After three fingers of whiskey?”

“How long have you been spying on me?”

Will bit down his annoyance and broke eye contact.

It wasn’t prudent of Lounds to goad him like this. He still couldn’t say definitively where “Will Graham” ended and “the Shrike” began. She couldn’t have known exactly how difficult it became when his sense of self was blurred. His own identity and the killer’s were watercolors, while his mind was the paper. The problem was, it was thin paper, the wrong kind for holding watercolors — it was too permeable and eventually it tore.

But Lounds must have had some idea how this all vexed Will, if she’d really “read up” on him.

“Long enough,” she said.

“Why?”

“The public has the right to know more about the man who is going to catch the Shrike.”

“You’re very confident in my abilities.”

“Because they’re extraordinary. One might even say supernatural. You’ve solved every case you’ve ever had.”

“The evidence leads. I just follow. It’s like being able to read music or another language. There is nothing supernatural about it. It just takes practice.”

“But that’s not all there is to it,” said Lounds.

“You would know it is, if you’ve really done your research.”

“Not fond of eye contact, are you?”

“Not fond of being accosted outside my own home,” Will said. “No matter how new it is.” They’d barely gone a few proper steps off the property line. He kept trying to go forward, but Lounds kept buffering him back.

“Is it what cost you your wife?”

“That’s clever,” he said, giving a short, hollow laugh. “Yes, if you have to ask — Molly hated the invasion of privacy almost more than I did. In the end, anyway.” Will tried to sidestep Lounds and failed. “I couldn’t, in good conscience, convince her to stay in a position where she was miserable.” Things had been more complex than that, but he wasn’t about to tell Miss Fredericka Lounds the finer points of his marital breakdown.

“How gallant.”

“Gallantry? More like common decency. It wasn’t chivalry.”

“Fascinating. I never got the impression that you were such an egalitarian,” said Lounds.

“There’s your story, then,” Will said acridly. “For your editor. ‘Will Graham — Not a Tyrant Toward Women.’ Or maybe, if you’re feeling maudlin, ‘Inspector Graham, the Secret Romantic.’ That one might do more for me, personally, actually; I’ve not met intimate desires in a long while. Maybe it would attract certain interests. Not to be vulgar.” He had an edge in his voice and hated its presence. “Good evening, Miss Lounds.”

She finally stepped aside and let him pass. He was half a yard away when she called after him, “What about your stepson? Did that have more to do with it than people like me? We’re all just doing our jobs, Inspector. I can promise you that — nobody was trying to ruin your life.”

Will kept walking as birdsong cut through the air.


	4. Chapter 4

Chiyoh knew most westerners read her as “Chinese” because they couldn’t be bothered to understand she really wasn’t. Until she’d gone to Europe, then America, with her mistress, she’d never traveled outside of Japan.

She’d met more people from China in Baltimore than she’d ever encountered elsewhere. She commiserated with them in English, or their respective dialects interspersed with English and gestures. Everyone came to the same conclusion: dominant people here didn’t seem to care about the finer points of ancestry and tradition unless they were their own.

It had long since stopped irking her. She was older now and harder to offend, if not less prone to anger. Their ignorance meant it was easier to slip unnoticed into different, convenient circumstances; she was always mistaken for another woman who “looked like her.” This was how she made her living.

Employed by Jack Crawford, she gathered information for him. She wouldn’t claim the title of “spy” because it felt too glamorous and ostentatious. It was, though, the simplest word for her occupation.

She watched her mark from across a small, smoke-laden, windowless room and smirked as his chapped lips found the pipe, then lost it. He was like a child trying to nurse and failing to latch. She was here — one of the quieter establishments in the city that served opium — for Crawford. He wanted her to find Will Graham, his new detective.

To be accurate, Crawford hadn’t sent her here directly. He’d sent her first to Graham’s house, which she’d found empty with the exception of two sad-looking dogs. But Crawford had warned her that Graham had a history of addiction. In the event he wasn’t home, which was likely, he gave her a manageable list of places Graham might go to indulge himself. This was the fourth she’d entered. Armed with Graham’s description — Crawford had also supplied it, just in case — she was confident the man in her view was the correct person.

When required, this den’s proprietor reluctantly allowed her to pose as a serving woman because he owed Crawford a favor. Neither man ever elaborated on what merited the debt, but Chiyoh assumed it had something to do with the small grocery the proprietor operated as a front to his more lucrative business. The “corner shop” never had the proper permits, possibly because they were expensive to maintain and he didn’t want to pay the right fees or taxes.

Crawford had forged a small but strong number of such relationships across the city. Chiyoh was therefore allowed to playact at will within several opium dens, a handful of saloons, and a few brothels. It was a useful arrangement: they’d gleaned several leads that way. Most of them were for comparatively tamer things than the murder case Graham was working on for Crawford.

There were always nervous wives whose husbands had gone missing for days —the husbands in question were almost always just sitting in the dark, somewhere, in a opiate or hashish induced stupor — and the occasional client with a crafty blackmailer who’d threatened to expose his — or more rarely, but not impossibly, her — habits. Chiyoh was hard to shock.

She had seen enough of the world to know life was never what it seemed, and everyone had their demons. Clever and quick, she never felt unsafe in these situations, either.

After Graham arched his back into the chair and smoke drifted from his nostrils, Chiyoh made her move. First, she donned her coat. Then she crept up to him with a little smile on her face and tapped his shoulder. She didn’t like to stay inside these kinds of places longer than she had to: though she never breathed too deeply, the smoke still got to her head. It was impossible to avoid.

Sometimes, that was helpful: it relaxed her. Largely, it annoyed her. She disliked feeling remotely light-headed, intoxicated.

Graham uttered a soft, questioning sound. His eyelids were heavy, but his eyes still focused on her. That was good. He was coherent. Crawford needed him to be, tonight.

“Mister Graham?” she asked.

“Mmhm,” he said. “I’ve already paid, haven’t I?” He was languid as a tired kitten. Chiyoh thought it would be just as easy to scruff and drag him out, but that wasn’t the tone she’d like to set for their first interaction. Opium had a different effect on everyone, in her experience. It seemed Graham was peaceable. She didn’t want to tempt fate and discover that he became rowdy when pressed, though. Intoxication was just too unpredictable that way. There was no need to use force unless she had to, so she let her hand linger on his upper arm. He glanced at her fingertips, then smiled up at her. “Oh. I don’t think I’m in a state for… anything like… that.”

She wrinkled her nose. The suggestion didn’t irk her; his scent did. It was probably the gentlest way she’d ever been told something about bedsport. This close, though, he stank of cheap bourbon and old sweat. It was pronounced even in the air’s heavy, lingering shroud. The smoke had a very distinct tone, cloying and metallic, that permeated almost anything. Chiyoh smelled it on her clothes for days after doing something like this.

That Graham’s personal smell could rise above it was both queerly impressive and disgusting.

“I’m not propositioning you,” she said with a sly chuckle, so if anyone took note of them, it would look like she actually was trying to do just that. She doubted these patrons were lucid enough to truly notice. There were only three other men present and it was too early in the evening for there to be more. But it was always best to be as thorough as possible. She bent down so that her mouth was by his ear. “I need you to come with me.”

The way she said it appeared to rouse him more than her words. “Why?”

“We can discuss that outside,” she said.

He turned his face to hers, searching her expression, and resigned himself to whatever he saw. “All right.”

Chiyoh nodded.

The man nearest to them glanced over, curiously, so she shot the stranger a coy look before pressing her lips to Graham’s.

This was nothing to her, not because she disliked kissing, but because she had very finite ideas about “work” versus “pleasure.”

Graham, however, reacted as though he hadn’t been kissed in months, dropping his pipe to the floor, opening his mouth readily to hers. Tolerantly, she tugged him to his feet by his lapels without breaking their kiss.

When she did pull away, she still led him by his coat to the back door. It was hard to gauge details in this lack of light, but she thought Graham looked mystified and wide-eyed. He still said and asked nothing, for which she was grateful. Once they were outside, she let go of him and brought a finger to her pursed lips. He did follow her.

Until they were two blocks away, Chiyoh didn’t speak. “My apologies, Mister Graham.”

“For… what?” he said.

“Accosting you.”

“I assume this has something to do with Jack Crawford,” he said, rubbing his face.

She looked at him with a small measure of surprise. “He said you were quick,” Chiyoh said, while she studied Graham.

He shrugged.

They were almost the same height when they were both standing. He hadn’t shaved for days and his dark curls were disheveled. She couldn’t say what color his eyes were in the nighttime — Crawford mentioned they were somewhere between dark blue and green, should she need to notice — yet Graham’s clothing was, in her opinion, the full giveaway to his identity. It had once been the height of fashion about a year ago, but was now ill-kept and ill-loved.

“My name is Chiyoh. I work for him.” She produced a discreet bit of tough paper — a method of identification granted by the city police and certified by Crafword — from the inside of her coat.

Graham waved it away. “In opium dens?”

“Wherever I’m required.”

Graham nodded. He wasn’t, she assumed, a stranger to operatives like her. They were more usual in private investigative work, but the police weren’t above employing them, too. “Crafty man, is Crawford. How’d he know where to find me?”

“He didn’t, exactly,” she said. “He gave me a shortlist of where you could be. I’m very good at finding people — even if they don’t want to be found.” She smiled, mostly with her eyes. “Luckily, you managed to pick the closest place to his office. It still didn’t save me a tour of the finest haunts.”

“Are we going there, now?”

“Yes.”

With a deep, shuddering breath — his first gasp of fresh air for at least an hour, probably — Graham asked, “Why?”

“He needs to speak with you.”

“So urgently that he sent someone to fetch me?”

“Doctor Price — that’s the coroner; I don’t know if you’ve met him, yet — finished his autopsy of the Jacobi girl. Price is largely employed by the city, so I believe there was something of a backlog. If that’s not too callous to say about bodies.”

Graham blanched and she let him fall silent. She wasn’t uncomfortable with the quiet. He walked along, still cocooned in his opium thrall.

She wondered if it was enough to help him feel any better... if it slowed the associations that apparently brought him such difficulty.

“I left my hat,” he finally said.

“If it looks like your coat, perhaps you will be better off purchasing a new one.”

He actually gave her a small smile. “Oh, it’s worse than this is.” He wiggled his arm. "A reporter down South said it looked like a tramp’s hat. Then that caught on — they’re like parrots. Once one of them says something they all take a perverse pleasure in, it becomes an echoing refrain.”

“I count myself fortunate that I’ve never been notorious enough to have to dodge reporters,” Chiyoh said.

“But you’ve probably got to dodge other unpleasant people.” He rubbed at his eyes, then his mouth. “Look… I should be the one apologizing. I don’t… obviously you kissed me as part of a ruse.” His eyes flitted to her dress, which was peaking out from her camelhair coat. It was golden silk edged with delicate black embroidery, the sort of thing a woman who worked in a den of inequity might use to attract custom. Chiyoh wore it when she needed to appear as one. It wasn’t all that it seemed, though: it was tailored for greater freedom of movement than most garments of its ilk. “Which… I can appreciate keeping up pretenses for safety’s sake. I’ve had to act, myself. You can’t risk your cover, and I’m sure there are regulars wherever you go.” Chiyoh waited for him to finish saying what he meant to say. “I am sorry I was so… enthusiastic. That was not… appropriate.”

She ducked her head in acknowledgement. “Thank you. But you are not particularly sober, are you?”

He smiled ruefully. “True, but that doesn’t give me the right to kiss strange women who say they’re not propositioning me. Even if they start to kiss me first.”

Chiyoh watched a giggling young couple across the road. The rain had given way to a cloudy, sedate sky. The temperature had been brought down considerably. People were taking advantage.

She said, “Then we’ve reached an entente, Mister Graham. Think no more of it. I did what I thought would get you out of that chair and into the night.” Smugly, she added, “And I was correct.”

“Crawford pays you for a reason,” said Graham. “You must have keen instincts.”

She steered him down a long, narrow alleyway that was a shortcut to Crawford’s office. “This way is quicker.”

“I don’t know my way around, yet.”

“Maybe you won’t be here long enough to need any local knowledge,” she said.

“Maybe.”

“Where will you go when your work here is done?” She was interested as a matter of course, one professional to another. She didn’t think Graham could easily return to New Orleans — or that he especially wished to do so.

“It might not be,” he said.

“You don’t have any reason to think that,” she said. They edged past a real woman of the night and her client. The lady was against the damp brick, feigning, thought Chiyoh with detachment, an admirable but unrealistic amount of interest in her companion’s attentions. “You’ve never left a case unsolved, have you?”

Graham didn’t react at all to the man and woman fornicating in public; he shuffled past them without comment just as Chiyoh had.

“No. I haven’t. But there’s a first time for everything. The Shrike might elude me.”

“Would you stay here? If you solved it. Or… even if you didn’t.”

“I don’t know,” said Graham. “I think I’d like to retire.” He paused and laughed a little bitterly. “Especially if I don’t catch him. I’ve got nearly enough money saved to be all right. Maybe I could live in the country, somewhere.”

“Your dogs would like that.”

“My dogs?”

“The ones in your house right now. Few dogs like to be indoors all the time.”

“Oh, you…” Graham smiled, mostly to himself. “You stopped home, first. Goodness, Crawford must really be impatient to go.”

Chiyoh motioned him around a corner. They were now on a more business-oriented block that hosted offices, shops, and a small deli. The shopfronts and offices were closed with the exception of Crawford’s, whose lights were glowing through the windows. The deli’s café never became too boisterous, but it was always populated with customers and their chatter carried up the street.

“Yes, I did,” she said. “The papers said you collect dogs. They think it’s a strange habit. They wonder what you do with them.”

“I know,” he said. There was a sudden edge to his voice. “They like to think I torture them.”

“You take care of them,” Chiyoh said.

She didn’t need to lead him, now. He understood exactly where they were and walked a little less like he was under the influence of opium.

“Yes, I do. They’re like… family. Or friends.” Graham calmed himself. “I’ll take these two with me, or keep them here. If I... stay. I found new homes for my pack in New Orleans. Just seemed easier. I didn’t know when I’d be coming back. If I'd be coming back. Still don’t.” He sniffed, his eyes red-rimmed from drug use and emotion, and glanced at Chiyoh. “Winston and Charlie, the ones here are called. Charlie was the Jacobi family dog, but they thought he’d let them down. So…” Graham looked up at the deep blue clouds. “I took him. He doesn’t understand what’s going on, poor little man.”

As they went up the steps to Crawford’s office, Chiyoh said, “Do they think a man capable of murdering grown women would be somehow unable to hurt a pet? Neither is terribly large, from what I saw. I don't know which was the family's. But. What could either of them have done to defend their daughter?”

Mirthless, Graham said, “Exactly. And Charlie is the smaller of the two. He’s the spaniel. But the families of murder victims always act irrationally. They want so dearly for it never to have happened.”

He opened the door for Chiyoh and she went inside.

Chiyoh decided that she liked Will Graham.

She’d learned time and time again to trust her impressions, and they said he was decent.


End file.
